Commonly used approaches to the reconstruction of defective organs and/or tissues include cell therapy and tissue engineering. Cell therapy involves injecting cells directly into the part of the damaged tissue for repair. Problems associated with this approach include low cell density and low cell survival rate.
The major aspect of tissue engineering is the design and fabrication of constructs for the replacement of non-functional or damaged tissue. A general method of engineering tissues in vitro is the use of a scaffold, in or on which cells are grown. A respective scaffold should be biodegradable before or after implantation. Problems associated with this approach include nutrient and waste transport issues due to the high thickness of the scaffolds required coupled with a lack of cellular orientation especially in regenerating tissues that are anisotropic in nature, for example muscle tissues.
Culturing the tissue in vitro followed by subsequent implantation of the tissue into the body may overcome the issues of low cell density. Nonetheless, the problem of limited nutrient and waste transport remains a challenge.
Therefore, there remains a need to provide for a tissue construct that overcomes, or at least alleviates, the above problems.